Women with Disabilities: Barriers and Facilitators to Accessing ...

More documents

Recommendations

Info

WOMEN WITH DISABILITIES: BARRIERS AND FACILITATORS TO ACCESSING SERVICES DURING PREGNANCY,CHILDBIRTH AND EARLY MOTHERHOODSchool of Nursing and Midwifery, Trinity College Dublin4.7. Barriers to acceptability of services for women with ahearing impairment4.7.1. Attitudinal challenges from health professionalsWhen interacting and interfacing with health professionals the majority ofwomen with hearing impairment do not feel respected or supported (Steinberg,2006). Similar to women with a physical disability, their deafness becomes theirdefining characteristic to the detriment of the perception that they are competentindividuals. Health professionals tend to be paternalistic and patronising(Steinberg, 2006) and health professionals’ assumptions about the woman’sdeafness significantly impacts on the establishment of a productive relationship(Iezzoni et al, 2004). Health professionals fail to recognise and appreciate thetotality of deaf women’s lives. Disrespecting the woman’s intelligence,motivation and her wishes to participate in her care is a common experiencewhen women encounter health professionals (Iezzoni et al, 2004). The lack ofknowledge of health professionals about the auxiliary aids that could assistwomen with hearing impairment in their parenting tasks is also a huge source offrustration for many deaf women (Harris and Bamford, 2001). Many womenreport being offered additional prenatal anomaly screening (Stern at al, 2002;Piotrowski and Snell, 2007) and feeling pressurised to consent to suchscreening, or feeling guilty or selfish if they gave birth to a disabled child.4.8. Barriers for women with disability from ethnic minoritygroupsThere is a paucity of research in relation to the experiences of women withdisabilities who are from ethnic minority groups (Pierce, 2003). The lack ofinformation helps to sustain the challenges encountered by this population asthe deficit in the provision of health care services remains unexplored andundocumented. The physical, attitudinal, communicational and informationalchallenges experienced by this population is similar to those discussed inrelation to women with a sensory impairment; however, for this population theissue of ethnicity compounds women’s experiences even more and the effectsare often more profound and detrimental. Women in this population are83
WOMEN WITH DISABILITIES: BARRIERS AND FACILITATORS TO ACCESSING SERVICES DURING PREGNANCY,CHILDBIRTH AND EARLY MOTHERHOODSchool of Nursing and Midwifery, Trinity College Dublin‘exposed to multiple discriminations based on racism and disablism’ (Pierce,2003:pg. 4). Moreover, many health professionals lack awareness of andcontact with minority ethnic women with disabilities (Pierce, 2003).Similar to other women with disabilities the woman’s impairment is consideredas the main component of her identity, often to the determinant of othercomponents such as gender, race and ethnicity (Shah and Priestley, 2001).Consequently, the woman’s culturally different needs are overlooked andignored, or if determined the women is treated indifferently (Shah and Priestley,2001). Health professionals’ indifference of other cultures is often portrayed asinsensitivity (Shah and Priestley, 2001; Pierce, 2003), which can have adetrimental effect on the health and social well-being of women with disabilitiesfrom ethnic minorities and can marginalise them even more. The most commonchallenges encountered by women in this population is the lack of knowledgeabout available services, inadequate provision of appropriate information andlinguistic and communication challenges (Pierce, 2003). Health information isnot available in both the appropriate language and the appropriate format suchas large print, pictorial, video and audio or Braille format (Pierce, 2003), whichraises important questions around the issue of informed decision making andconsent.The communication challenges encountered by this group can be immense.Translators are necessary to facilitate effective communication but they are notalways available when required. Women incur long delays while waiting fortranslators to arrive for an appointment and in some instances their servicesmay not used at all. In the latter circumstance health professionals rely onfamily members or friends to act as interpreters. This is inappropriate and thereis huge potential for information to be misinterpreted. When sign languageinterpreters are used, difficulties can be encountered because sign languagediffers in different countries so the interpreter may be unable to interpret thewomen’s signing or the women is unable to interpret the information being84
Page 1 and 2:
University of DublinTrinity College
Page 3 and 4:
WOMEN WITH DISABILITIES: BARRIERS A
Page 5 and 6:
Page 7 and 8:
Page 9 and 10:
Page 11 and 12:
Page 13 and 14:
Page 15 and 16:
Page 17 and 18:
Page 19 and 20:
Page 21 and 22:
Page 23 and 24:
Page 25 and 26:
Page 27 and 28:
Page 29 and 30:
Page 31 and 32:
Page 33 and 34:
Page 35 and 36:
Page 37 and 38:
Page 39 and 40:
Page 41 and 42:
Page 43 and 44:
Page 45 and 46:
Page 47 and 48:
Page 49 and 50:
Page 51 and 52: WOMEN WITH DISABILITIES: BARRIERS A
Page 101: WOMEN WITH DISABILITIES: BARRIERS A
Page 153 and 154:
Page 155 and 156:
Page 157 and 158:
Page 159 and 160:
Page 161 and 162:
Page 163 and 164:
Page 165 and 166:
Page 167 and 168:
Page 169 and 170:
Page 171 and 172:
Page 173 and 174:
Page 175 and 176:
Page 177 and 178:
Page 179 and 180:
Page 181 and 182:
Page 183 and 184:
Page 185 and 186:
Page 187 and 188:
Page 189 and 190:
Page 191 and 192:
Page 193 and 194:
Page 195 and 196:
Page 197 and 198:
Page 199 and 200:
Page 201 and 202:
Page 203 and 204:
Page 205 and 206:
Page 207 and 208:
Page 209 and 210:
Page 211 and 212:
Page 213 and 214:
show all

Women with Disabilities: Barriers and Facilitators to Accessing ...

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?